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17 Pound Gun
Tactical Analysis * Gun on a Carriage: The 17 pound gun is a old but powerful British anti tank weapon, dating back to before WWII. Unlike more modern anti tank weapons, the 17 pound gun is nothing fancy, being little more than a gun mount on a carriage with a gun crew. *'With Heavy Tank Stopping Power...': In spite of its age, the 17 pound gun is still a formidable anti tank weapon. It is more than capable against the armour of Red Chinese tanks, and can acquire and engage targets in quick succession. *'...Comes a (Ridiculously) Heavy Weight': Although it is a formidable anti tank weapon, the 17 pound is extremely heavy. Since there are no more tractors to tow the guns, the crew must tow the gun manually, with a severe lack of mobility. *'Bigger Gun': Some gun crews have managed to salvage 105mm guns from the wrecks of Bulldogs, as well as the 105mm ammunition needed to keep them supplied, though the additional weight is enough to dissaude most crews. The benefit is that the Bulldog's 105mm gun is even more powerful than the British 17 pounder, deadly to any target within range. Operational History Before the Bombs Near the beginning of the Civil War in China, the remnants of the Nationalists were being swamped by the seemingly endless waves of Battlemaster Tanks. The Nationalists did not have enough resources to produce their own tanks to counter them and so turned to its Britain. After promising to help destroy the Red Scourge after they had unified China, Britain began shipping over obsolete wheeled anti-tank gun emplacements. These so called "17 Pound Guns" were very cheap to make and could destroy a Battlemaster with a single hit. When the most of the world had settled back into peace after the death of Stalin, the 17 pound gun had become outdated. Due to its cheapness and reliability it was given a refit with new armour piercing sabot rounds. The old anti tank guns soon proved their worth, smashing wave after wave of Battlemasters. The 17 pounders proved more than able to penetrate the armour of anything the Red Chinese threw at them. A few anti tank guns, towed into a good ambush position by tractors, can decimate a battalion of armour. In one famous occasion, a small group of anti tank guns stalled a Red Chinese armour advance for over an hour before they ran out of ammunition, and reportedly managed to destroy one of the dreaded Overlord tanks. The crews of these defensive guns were known for their patriotism and dedication to the Republic of China, where they would stay behind to man the guns even as they were swamped by Red Chinese soldiers. As the war dragged on and the Blue Chinese dug in further into their defensive lines, the 17 pounders were relocated less frequently, until by the end of the war most 17 Pound Guns just stayed in their positions, holding off wave after wave of Red Chinese armour, day after day, hour after hour. After the Bombs After the bombs, warlords, formerly officers of the National Revolutionary Army, began to try and establish their own little fiefdoms in the tattered, radiation scarred wastelands of China. Before long, they realised they would need defences to protect their territory from the banditry that roamed the wastelands, as well as other competing warlords and the forces of the Atomic Kingdom. Having little resources with which to make new weapons with, they had to suffice for what equipment they could salvage. In the aftermath of the atomic holocaust, thousands of 17 pounders had survived, since they had been out in the field rather than near the cities which had been target to the atomic bombs, still in the same places they had dug in to hold off the waves of Battlemasters. Though many of their crews had either died of radiation poisoning or abandoned their guns for safe shelter, these guns remained, forming a defensive buttress against an enemy that had long been reduced to radioactive ash, slowly rusting away. It was easy enough to form salvage teams to go and retrieve these guns, sending them to dig the guns out of their entrenched positions and haul them back. With vast quantities of ammunition stockpiled in Blue Chinese Command bunkers, they could be supplied easily enough. They had to be transported by human (or in some cases, animal power, mainly the mutated, cadaverous cows prevalent in China after most of the normal cows died out) since the vast majority of tractors had either broken down completely in the wake of the atomic exchange, or otherwise had their engines stripped and retrofitted onto recovered Mastiff tanks. With this, the 17 pounders still dig in against the forces of the enemy, holding back wave after wave of tanks. However, where they once did so against the forces of Red China, and where their crews were once patriotic countrymen, they now destroy anything deemed to be a threat by the survivalist warlords of a post-apocalyptic China, and their crews are desperate, worked to the bone survivors of a nuclear armageddon. Category:Units